Is Health Insurance Anti-Life?

Why Father John hates Obamacare

Catholic Charities describes itself as a “social justice movement,” one that sees its mission as providing “service to people in need” and giving aid to local agencies “in their efforts to reduce poverty.” Given the role of health care expenses in pushing people into poverty, then, you would think Roman Catholic leaders would be big fans of Obamacare, which by extending health insurance to millions of Americans is possibly the most important piece of anti-poverty legislation passed by Congress in decades. Oh yes, and given the demonstrated link between having health insurance and living longer, it may also be a pretty powerful piece of pro-life legislation.

But Father John, a diocese Roman Catholic priest who I spoke with recently, considers Obamacare to be an “Obamanation” and describes Obama himself as “the most evil president of my lifetime."

How is it that the Father Johns of the world have come to despise Obamacare so much? And what do their emotions teach us about the challenge of building public support for anti-poverty legislation more generally?

Father John’s feelings arise from a wellspring of sources. They start no doubt with his deep Republican roots, roots that have been growing further into the ground for many Roman Catholic priests since the time of Roe v. Wade. Before this controversial Supreme Court decision, most American Catholics were Democrats—blue collar, European immigrants with a taste for social justice. After Roe v. Wade, however, the church made it a priority to emphasize opposition to abortion, meaning when the Democrats became the pro-choice party, it set up a clash between the party and the church. Other feminist causes also housed themselves in the Democratic Party—topics like birth control, which also riled the Roman Catholic leadership (if not its congregations).

Father John has been an ardent Republican for years, so he was already skeptical of anything that a Democrat like Obama would come up with. His skepticism was pushed into overdrive, however, when Obama decided to mandate that employers offer birth control coverage in their employee health plans. Obama’s later compromise, to require insurance companies to pay for all contraceptives rather than employers, was too little, too late for Father John: “That’s totally bogus,” he told me.

With strong emotional opposition to Obama never far from his mind, Father John had a difficult time opening himself up to the idea that Obamacare has any potential merits. When I spoke with him about my wife, who has a pre-existing diagnosis of breast cancer, and explained that if she lost her job she would be unable to afford health insurance were it not for Obamacare, he grudgingly admitted that such protection was a good thing. (Indeed, Mitt Romney seemed to make a similar argument recently, but most policy experts don’t see how he could do that—force insurance companies to cover people with pre-existing conditions—without also mandating like he did in Massachusetts that healthy people buy insurance.)

When I explained that people like my wife would be bankrupted by tens of thousands of dollars of medical bills if they didn’t have insurance, Father John commiserated with their fate. But his empathy quickly disappeared, as he found himself ranting again about how Obama wanted to “trample on religious liberty.” He ended our conversation with a terse summary of his position: “I feel for people with illnesses they didn’t bring upon themselves. But I worry that people will become dependent on the government.”

If Father John gets his way, and Obamacare is repealed by Mitt Romney and a Republican Congress, Americans with pre-existing conditions will be free once again to go bankrupt over health care expenses. At that point, they will have little choice but to become dependent on the kindness of strangers—or the generosity of Catholic Charities—to help them escape the grip of medically induced poverty.

Speaking as a genuinely conservative, Catholic Republican, I'd LOVE to beleieve that the typical Catholic priest in the USA is a Father John.

In reality, abortion is one of the VERY few issues on which the Catholic Church in America can be labeled as "conservative." On virtually all other issues, the Church tilts left.

The Church OPPOSES the death penalty. The Church OPPOSES most U.S. military actions. The Church invariably SUPPORTS increased welfare spending.

The typical Father John has been supporting socialized medicine for many years. Most Catholic clergy WANT to endorse Obamacare wholeheartedly, and WOULD do so if Barack Obama weren't so hell-bent on forcing the Church to pay for contraceptives.

intead of disingenuously asking "Why doesn't Father John want poor people to get health care," you should be asking, "Why is barack Obama foolishly and arrogantly pushing away people who WANT to support him?"

Birth control pills are neither expensive nor hard to come by. If Obama could get the enthusiastic support of the Catholic hierarchy by exempting them from paying for something they regard as immoral, why does he refuse to do so?

Barack Obama is the inflexible ideologue in this casxe, not "Father John."

Fr. John is a real person, and a real conservative, who doesn't share the Church's views on things like the Iraq war or on income redistribution.

My point here is to show the psychology of partisanship, which many reader comments have illustrated nicely.

Whatever one thinks of Obamacare, we should recognize that expanding insurance to millions of Americans is a GOOD thing. Was Obama's approach the best way to do this? Of course not. Did it create more harm than benefit? We can debate that, certainly.

But for people who value life, health insurance should be seen as a good thing. It saves lives!

So you're implying that obamacare is the only route? Look, I would love for everyone to have health insurance willingly, but what we have now is simply not the answer. When the answer does come, then I'll be open to it.

What happened to the days when people were not reliant upon the government? Social security is a fairly new system compared to the age of humanity--how did people get along so well (particularly in the golden years if they made it there) and now they are dependent of the government? It was the generosity of the church and children who helped them. Caring for the poor was a community effort possibly made so by law (Jewish law and leaving some crops for the poor), but still, it was the local angels whom helped those folks.

It is important for us, as you point out, to make broad efforts to help people in need, and not rely on the government to do everything.

But those angels you talk about? Where were they when tens of millions of people were allowed to go without health insurance? And when tens of thousands of them suffered, unnecessarily, because they couldn't afford important health care?

The hospital industry used to pass along costs of uninsured patients to others. But that is hard to do these days, as insurance companies, understandably, stop allowing hospitals to pass along costs this way.

I'm open to LOTS of ways to maximize the number of insured in this country. But we need to start by recognizing that charity alone HASN'T helped all those needy people. If it had, we wouldn't be in this position.

I think some religious people are confused with what their rights actually are and what we let them get away with. If you dont like birth control/being gay/obamacare you can opt out of it yourself.Its a personal choice not to be gay or take birthcontrol. You can also opt out of obamacare if it is against your religion. However, these people seem to think that their right is to force whoever is under them to live under their beliefs.

Obamacare won't please everybody, because it is the best that could be done given our corrupt, bought-and-paid-for legislature. For all of the whining and bluster about Obamacare, I rarely see any serious alternatives being offered except for the ludicrous notion that the uninsured can just go to the ER. I think a big reason for that lack of alternatives is because Obamacare actually INCLUDES items that were originally conservative ideas, like requiring mandatory participation.

My serious question to Obamacare opponents is this: if Obamacare were repealed today, would you be OK with people continually suffering, dying, and going bankrupt because they cannot afford treatment, even WITH insurance because companies could simply drop their clients after they became ill? THAT is better for our society than Obamacare? Why? Instead of Obamacare, what could be proposed that could be taken seriously by today's lawmakers and not get hyperbolically shouted down as freedom-killing socialism (except when hey, Medicare is totally fine)? Is it so hard to admit that sometimes, with something as vital and necessary to life and dignity as one's own health, that the free market system alone has proven that it cannot provide the best-fit solutions for our society?

By the way, even with the issue of birth control, some women need it in order to manage conditions and not just for contraception. Protecting unborn lives is important, but reproductive issues are not all cut-and-dried. Some women may have or be recovering from conditions, too, that if they were to get pregnant would seriously harm or kill them. And obviously, not everyone is Catholic. It may not seem fair to Catholics, but I think it is more unfair to penalize ALL women for what they need to manage their health, and especially women who are not even Catholic. If indirectly paying for contraception is the trade-off in order to address the physical and financial suffering of countless individuals and families then I would just have to sit down and pray a few more Our Fathers and Hail Marys.

Democrats: "Let's tweek and build on what we have"
Republicans: "Let's tear it down. The market will be compassionate."

According to the World Health Organization America is behind ARGENTINA in quality of care. That's what we get for letting the markets determine cost and services. We pay the most for health care in the world. People are up in arms because they don't want government regulators standing between health and themselves? How do they enjoy corporations standing between they and their health? How has that been working out?

"Obamacare" cuts costs and prevents the very ill going bankrupt from medical costs. Let's build on that and fix issues during implementation.